A cool breeze wafted through the open windows of Hogwarts, inviting eyes both young and aged to indulge in nature’s masterpiece of the day. The sky wasn’t perfectly clear. Instead, wide, feathery clouds hovered overhead with hills and valleys raked along their lengths.
Ginny stood in stark contrast. Her eyes seemed determined to pound everyone into a two-dimensional image. Harry knew it couldn’t have been about him, because from the stairs leading to her dormitory to the door of the common room (where she was angrily thrusting parchment into her bag), she’d been grumbling like a torn engine.
“Ginny, what’s wrong?” He tried to keep the exasperation from his voice.
“Well, it’s nothing you ought to be concerned about. It’s not you that’s been losing her brothers to one thing or another all bleeding year.” She threw her bag over her shoulder, supremely unconcerned that Harry had to duck to avoid being hit.
“Is it Charlie?” he asked while walking her to breakfast. He wanted to be more worried, but somehow, the way she was behaving was making him want to laugh instead.
She wrinkled her nose sourly. “Bill.”
“What happened? He’s all right, right?”
“Pfft. No. He’s being completely selfish! Did he even bother to think about how I might feel, or how wrong it is? It’s ridiculous! And he wants to trot around, acting like nothing’s happened, but I know! I saw her writing him.”
“Who?”
Ginny shot a glare straight into his pupils. “McKee.”
Had a frog not chosen that exact time to launch itself in Harry’s throat, sending him into coughing spasms, he would have laughed. “Are you sure about this?” he asked disbelievingly.
“Yes!” she shouted, her face crumpling together to resemble a pumpkin. “I saw it! She was writing a note to him! And when I wrote a note to him asking about the other note, he sent . . . just . . . this completely different note back that didn’t answer anything!”
“When did this happen?” Harry was fighting the grin, but the grin was slowly winning.
“Oh . . . er . . . two or three weeks ago.’
He chortled. “And you’re just now getting upset about it?”
“I think she’s planning something. Perhaps she’s seducing him.”
Harry guffawed. “Bill can take care of himself, I’m sure . . .”
His girlfriend narrowed her eyes at him as they entered the clamoring Great Hall. “Not a word,” she said curtly before reaching the Gryffindor table.
It seemed they had arrived in conjunction with the morning owls. A rather large one flopped down in front of Hermione. She dug through her pickets for a Knut while Ron read a letter from Mrs. Weasley. “Oh, bad luck, Harry,” he muttered.
“What does it say?”
“’ . . . We might be a tad bit late, as we have to wait for Mundungus to arrive, and we all know how dependable he is. Also, Albus Dumbledore sent me an owl early this morning asking that Harry stay at Hogwarts for Easter holiday. It’s no use asking me why not, because that’s between Harry and Professor Dumbledore. Please, Ron, pass my love on to him, and let him know that . . .’”
Harry growled and stared foully at his plate. “Of course I have to stay here. Wouldn’t want Harry to enjoy any of his holidays, now would we?” he spat. He could have stewed raw meat in his abdomen, he was sure of it.
“Professor Dumbledore likely wants to squeeze in more Occlumency lessons.” Hermione was entirely too practical, he decided. “Speaking of Easter holiday, I’ll have to leave a bit early tomorrow. My mum has an early engagement, and I wouldn’t want her to miss it.”
“Ok,” they chorused.
‘Well, personally, I think Harry could use a bit of seriousness over holiday, because right now, everything is just hilarious to him.” She pursed her lips in a McGonagall-like manner.
“What’s funny?” Ron smirked, sure he would enjoy the answer.
“She thinks Bill and McKee have caught each other’s fancy.”
“Not each other. She wrote to him. He’s just being polite, of course.”
Ron snorted (and surprisingly, so did Hermione). “Bill and McKee? He’d have to be mad to want a Grendel like her!”
“She’s not a Grendel!”
Hermione cleared her throat loudly, eyeing a new arrival over Harry’s shoulder.
Luna Lovegood stared through Harry’s forehead. “The one with whom your truth resides, written by the hand of love, will find only company with hate and greed. All will be revealed in it’s time. The truth escapes tomorrow.”
The four merely stared, speechless, for a long moment.
“Oh, is that all, then?” blurted Ron, finally breaking the silence.
“Er . . . Luna? Are you all right?” he asked with an almost gentle tone.
She blinked and smiled lightly. “It’s quite a lovely day. My father says that bowtruckles enjoy swimming on days like this.”
Hermione wisely bit her tongue.
“Harry, it’s all right,” she mused aloud. “We do not guide Fate; it guides us.” Her scraggly hair slipped over her shoulder as she gave the silent friends a persistently content smile, and left.
“Well . . . that was . . . unexpected.” Thought lines scribbled themselves on Hermione’s forehead. Ron, however, was staring at Ginny and Harry.
“What?”
“Love, eh?” he chortled.
The couple blushed furiously, before making quick excuses and rushing off to their first classes with unparalleled enthusiasm.
Harry’s thoughts were plagued by Luna’s words all throughout his classes. Her voice didn’t really change like Trelawney’s did. It couldn’t have been a real prophecy. But what if it was? What was the bit about love? I don’t love Ginny, do I? If it was a real prophecy, something will happen tomorrow. Why would Luna have said it, unless it was real? What if it was a prophecy that doesn’t come true? Does that mean Professor Trelawney’s prediction was false?
His heart picked up a beat at the last thought. An escape from his stifling destiny was more than welcome.
He’d come to no conclusion even as the sunlight waned into twilight.
He and Ginny sat in the common room amidst noisy activity. Everyone was packing for the few days they’d get to spend with their families. For some, it was a sullen affair; they’d return to grieving relatives in dark clothing. For others, it was a blessing, and they meant to enjoy every spare minute they were given with their loved ones.
The Weasleys were somewhere in between; they were neither happy, nor sad. Ron was a bit fidgety about leaving Harry at Hogwarts. He said all the important bits happened when he was gone. Hermione, in order to relieve the air of anxiety, dragged him off to the library where they could contemplate the meaning of the ‘prophecy’. Harry had the sneaking suspicion that she was working of the formerly transfigured skin.
As for the prophecy, working on the assumption that it was legitimate, everyone was quite sure that Ginny would be the love and truth escaping Hogwarts.
Harry didn’t want to invest such faith in words coming from someone who believed in the Crumple-Horned Snorkack, but a nervous tension had managed to seat itself in his diaphragm nonetheless.
Even now, he was unable to control the flares that emitted from the region as he watched Ginny. She, like Harry, wasn’t doing anything in particular. She would stare at the portraits, or the fire, or have short conversations with passersby.
Finally, their eyes caught each other. She blew a hair out of her face, stood, and padded over to where Harry reclined on the couch. Ginny leaned against him and pulled a quilt off the arm of the sofa and over top her legs.
Harry was stunned. He coughed uncomfortably. “Er . . . Ginny?”
“Hmm?”
“What are you doing?”
“Sitting with my boyfriend,” she answered succinctly.
“Oh.” He found himself slouching, trying to regain his composure. One minute, he hadn’t properly kissed Ginny in months, and the next, she was on his lap. His mind began to drift until he heard the feminine rumbling of her voice.
“I lied earlier. I wish you could celebrate Easter with us.” She didn’t look at him, just rested her head against his shoulder (which he decided now was entirely too boney).
“I want to, but Dumbledore insists I stay. Here. Again. It seems like that’s all I hear anymore,” he complained grumpily.
She rolled onto her side, adjusting her weight so as to not cause internal bleeding. She gazed at the intricately woven African carpet at the foot of the sofa. “Harry? What if it is about me?” she asked somewhat reluctantly.
“I don’t know. I don’t even know that it’s a real prophecy.”
“It is.”
“How do you know?” Harry challenged.
“I read her.
“Then, if it is real,” he sighed, “something will happen very soon.”
“We have to stop it.”
“I know. It’s a matter of figuring out how.” He was horribly distracted by the vibration her voice created on his chest.
“Someone you . . . love . . . could . . . disappear.”
Unsure, he replied, “I don’t know if it means that.”
“’Written by the hand of love.’ It couldn’t mean anything except someone you love, because the one you love holds your truth.”
“Can we not talk about this? Luna said it, for god’s sake.”
“Well, considering your history with her, she wouldn’t normally be inclined to say something like that.” She pursed her lips. He didn’t even have to see it to know it.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
For a serious discussion, their tones and body language didn’t show it. The Gryffindors ambulating about thought nothing of the two on the sofa. They likely thought them to be discussing points of their favorite Muggle films.
Ginny’s finger had taken to swishing back and forth just atop the skin on his arm. He didn’t like it. He had a feeling he knew where this was going.
“Harry, do you love me?” she asked quietly while looking up, finally, at his face.
He groaned. “Why are you asking me this now? There are people everywhere.”
“Because . . . I have a right to know if I’ll be wandering around with Hate and Greed tomorrow.” Making light of the situation didn’t make Harry any more inclined to have this conversation.
He would have chuckled if he wasn’t so backed into a corner. He was silent for a moment. This is not good. This is definitely not a good question. “Erm . . .”
The fear must have shown in his eyes as she pulled one of those girl moves. This was the one where she searched Harry’s face with one of her pouts. “It’s okay,” she whispered hastily. “I already know.”
He was still trying to figure out exactly what she thought she knew when she snaked an arm around his neck and landed hard against his lips. Her body was horribly twisted until she straightened out, using her hip to balance himself. She pulled away just as suddenly, leaving Harry flabbergasted.
What is she playing at?
Harry completely forgot their previous discussion as she once again leaned back against him. His mind was running wild. It was as if the world was speeding up. The ever-present song in his head was positively shrieking. Then, he felt something curious beneath the covers. She was rubbing his big toe with hers! He snorted.
“What?” she mumbled humorously.
“Nothing.”
He lay his hand on her abdomen and she sweetly covered his hand with her own. It was a bit odd to feel something like a heartbeat in her stomach. A burn slowly smoldered in his chest. He looked around the common room that was slowly emptying out.
Harry looked at the mane of red hair. Perhaps it was pretty, but it was also clinging to him in an annoying sort of way. He brought his hand up and wiped the wisps away, his fingers coming to a rest on her collar bone.
She has bony shoulders too, he realized. Except . . . His eyes drifted a bit downward and inexplicably, his fingers followed, albeit much more slowly. She stiffened, but remained steadfastly silent. He wondered what she must be looking at.
He was amazed when, beneath the privacy of the quilt, his hand found a slope. He was infinitely uncomfortable and inquisitive at the same time. She breathed light, shallow breaths while his fingers walked across the cloth, skimming the surface nervously. With a mind of its own, his palm found a spot that teased a breath away from Ginny. He was feeling a type of anticipation that was entirely new to him.
Until the portrait door opened.
Ginny gasped, “Accio book!” It flew into her hands and she ripped it open, devouring intellectual material.
“Hey Ginny, Harry. What have you two been up to?” Ron, shockingly, didn’t seem to suspect a thing.
“Just the prophecy.” Ginny and Hermione grinned at one another.
“Erm . . . About that. I was thinking that maybe we could sleep down here tonight . . . just in case,” Harry ventured.
That night, the bright moon hid the shadows, and the one that held the truth was gone.